Technical Field
The disclosed embodiments relate in general to systems and methods for positioning and navigation and, more specifically, to systems and methods employing coded lighting to dock autonomous vehicles, such as aerial drones, self-driving cars and surface robots.
Description of the Related Art
Precision docking is one of the most important tasks for aerial drones and surface robots to charge themselves and load/unload packages. Without accurate docking, surface robots and aerial drones will miss their charging pad or charging contacts and cannot automatically charge themselves for later tasks. Conventional docking techniques include vision (color) based systems described, for example, in Milo C. Silverman, Boyoon Jung, Dan Nies and Gaurav S. Sukhatme, Staying Alive Longer: Autonomous Robot Recharging Put to the Test, University of Southern California Center for Robotics and Embedded Systems (CRES) Technical Report CRES-03-015, 2003 and Yulun Wang, Goleta, Calif. (US); Charles S. Jordan, Santa Barbara, Calif. (US); Marco Pinter, Santa Barbara, Calif. (US); Daniel Steven Sanchez, Summerland, Calif. (US); James Rosenthal, Santa Barbara, Calif. (US); Amante Mangaser, Goleta, Calif. (US), DOCKING SYSTEM FOR A TELE-PRESENCE ROBOT, US 2010/0010672 A1, Jan. 14, 2010. The shortcomings of such systems include their reliance on environmental brightness and relatively slow speed of location determination.
Other conventional docking techniques rely on mechanical parts, which, as would be appreciated by persons of ordinary skill in the art, introduce a point of likely mechanical failure. Yet other systems utilize complicated region relations for an inaccurate direction guidance, as described, for example, in KWang-soo Lim, Seoul (KR); Sam-jong Jeung, GWangju (KR); Jeong-gon Song, GWangju (KR); Ju-sang Lee, GWangju (KR); Jang-youn Ko, GWangju (KR), SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR RETURNING ROBOT CLEANER TO CHARGER, U.S. Pat. No. 7,729,803 B2, Jun. 1, 2010, Jang-Youn Ko, GWangju (KR); Sam-Jong Jeung, GWanju (KR); Jeong-Gon Song, GWangju (KR); Ki-Man Kim, GWangju (KR); Ju-Sang Lee, GWangju (KR); KWang-Soo Lim, Gemcheon-Gu (KR), ROBOT CLEANER SYSTEM AND A METHOD FOR RETURNING TO EXTERNAL RECHARGING APPARATUS, U.S. Pat. No. 7,489,985 B2, Feb. 10, 2009 and Hyoung-deuk Im, Seoul (KR); Jong-il Park, Gupo_si (KR), MOBILE ROBOT AND MOBILE ROBOT CHARGE STATION RETURN SYSTEM, U.S. Pat. No. 7,397,213 B2, Jul. 8, 2008. Yet additional systems described, for example, in David A. Cohen, Brookline, Mass. (US); Daniel Ozick, Newton' Mass. (Us); Clara Vu, Cambridge, Mass. (Us); James Lynch, Georgetown, Mass. (US); Philip R. Mass, Denver, Colo. (US), AUTONOMOUS ROBOT AUTO-DOCKING AND ENERGY MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS AND METHODS, require the robot to move to region with overlapped signals from left and right, resulting in unnecessary sideways movements of the robot before docking.
In view of the above and other shortcomings of the conventional technology, new and improved systems and methods for precision docking are needed that would enable aerial drones and surface robots to quickly and effectively find their docking stations.